Royal Drawing School, The Foundation Year - Blythe Brett

Oct. 27, 2016

Blythe Brett came to the Royal Drawing School from Hills
Road Sixth Form College, Cambridge and completed The Foundation Year in
2016. She has since gone on to study
Design for Performance at the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama. We asked
Blythe to give us an insider’s glimpse into her experience on the course and
how it has shaped her future studies…

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Before joining The Foundation Year course I had
found it difficult to relate my interests in spatial and structural design with
traditional forms such as drawing and painting from life. Within the first few
weeks of workshops covering a range from observational work to printing and
sculpture, I began to see through the restrictions that tend to set in during
an A Level course. Instead of every piece I made needing to be precise and well
finished, I saw how experimenting and making mistakes is a vital process in
coming up with a well-rounded and exciting body of work. This gave me the
freedom to begin to explore the ideas and forms which most intrigued me within
all of my work – for example relating architectural structure to the figure
placed within it.

'The Figure in Space’ Life Drawing Exercise

The variety and helpfulness of tutors on the
course was great, all of them really got to know us and we were free to ask
them questions about our work as well as their own practice. Spending time with
them in the studio as well as during gallery days meant that we learnt about
the practicalities and realities of being a professional artist. Having
constant input from a range of tutors really helped my work to develop,
especially during personal projects, when the tutors could introduce me to new
theories and artists that had great relevance to my work.

The Friday gallery visits and the lectures at
the Royal Drawing School on Wednesday evenings were a vital part of the course
to me because they introduced me to a huge range of new inspirations. The talks
given to us by Antje Southern each Friday morning were endlessly interesting –
I built up a knowledge of artists and art theory of which I had no concept
before, which in turn developed my own ideas and gave my work a deeper level of
research and understanding.

Sculptural piece looking at the figure in
space, part of Personal Project 1

Experimentation became the most valuable
feature of the course for me, especially within my final personal project. One
of the group sculpture workshops in the second term had introduced me to a
playful and open attitude to materials – trying out different combinations with
many different structures to find the best result. Using this newfound freedom
I set myself to play with as many new materials as possible during my final
project; from taking apart abandoned machines and reassembling them, to
moulding delicate structures in wire and wood.

One of a collection of sculptures exploring
‘Headspace’, Final Personal Project

The most challenging part of the course is the
schedule, being full time every day can be demanding but it’s worth it. On most
other courses you are only in for 3 days a week and see a tutor maybe only once
a month. Being in the studio every day means you can really get involved with the
work and your stream of ideas isn’t interrupted, also because of the facilities
there is always the opportunity to try new methods – sculpture, printmaking,
painting and photography. I really got into photography and working in the
darkroom in the last few weeks of the course, I would really recommend it to
any new students. I had never found digital photography particularly useful but
the stages of developing an analogue print are exciting and there is a lot of
experimentation you can do with the enlarging and exposure process.

One of the things that had drawn me to the
foundation course with the Drawing School was the location of the studios:
Trinity Buoy Wharf is a fascinating place with a huge variety of architecture
and scenery to draw inspiration from. I also really enjoyed the Friday gallery
sessions when we often had opportunities to draw out in the London cityscape, including
one trip to draw from the Crossrail construction site at Liverpool Street and
another situated on a rooftop looking across at the Southbank of the Thames. My
sensitivity to architecture and structure definitely increased as a result of
these experiences, and it has now become a major part of my inspiration and
drive within my work in spatial and theatre design.

Drawing Out Exercise, North Bank, London

I am going on to study Design for Performance
at the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama, and I feel that my time on the
foundation has definitely prepared me for my development as a scenic designer. Over
the year I found a freedom of working with new methods and materials, I also
really improved my drawing skills which will be essential in the future. The
tutors and workshops helped me to appreciate that not every piece of work needs
to be perfect; instead, you can learn from mistakes and gather together many
small ideas to create one well developed body of work. The thing I value most
is my new knowledge of artists and themes, which has broadened my awareness of
art and design in the professional world. Some of the designers from whom I
take most inspiration were those I discovered whilst on The Foundation Year,
and I am continuing to explore the themes from my work on the course in my
current projects - including installations for Cambridge Fusion Theatre Festival
and work for the Edinburgh Fringe Festival 2016.